


Might As Well Be Proud Of Last Place

by th_esaurus



Category: Rush (2013)
Genre: Casual Sex, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-24
Updated: 2013-10-24
Packaged: 2017-12-30 09:26:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1016952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/th_esaurus/pseuds/th_esaurus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are always cubbyholes and storerooms at clubs like this. Places for underhand trades and haphazard lovers. James and Niki are six of one, a half dozen of the other.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Might As Well Be Proud Of Last Place

 

 _Marlene, komm,_ he bites, and he knows she hears him through the crowd but Marlene won't be snipped at. She's contrary, like him, and it gives him brief insight into why people like and loathe him in equal measure.

 

So what Marlene does instead of accompanying him to the car is laugh at James' crass jokes with her neck bared and her hand coquettishly at her collarbone. Niki clucks his tongue in the way Marlene says makes him sound like an old maid, but she's too busy gently mocking James' earnest flirtation to hear. He looks so chuffed. He looks like he thinks he's won her.

 

James functions under the assumption that if one has something, then one must have a collection. He does it with everything he can. Trophies. Girls. Fucking budgerigars.  Niki has seen his makeshift aviary, a hundred or more birds in cages and crates in the back garden of his house; every time they took a shit or screeched their livid chirp, James would look tickled and think they had missed him while he'd been away.

 

Suzy wasn't there, that one time he visited the untidy little house. Niki showered in James' bathroom, and slept in James' marital bed, and told James to sleep on the sofa. The mattress was very solid. He imagined it did not have the weight of two people on it much often.

 

So now Marlene has her fingers on James' chest. His shirt open to here. She illustrates with an unpainted nail.

 

Niki is not close enough to grab her wrist, but he's close enough to make her notice his frown.

 

 _You cannot fuck my wife,_ he says aloud.

 

 _Christ,_ James hisses, all his optimism dropping from his face. He keeps his drink steady, though. Wouldn't waste booze like that. He hadn't realized Niki was there at all.

 

Marlene holds Niki's face in her hands and kisses him mildly, patronizingly. She knows he is only chivalrous when he has something to prove. James watches the path of her lips from his mouth to his cheek.

 

 _Play nicely, boys_ , she says. A lesser woman would blow James a kiss. Marlene walks away.

 

James calls her a fine woman and Niki calls him an asshole. James has already asked him, both honestly and rhetorically, how a man with a face like his landed a girl like Marlene; he doesn't bother to ask again. He lights a cigarette and stupidly offers one to Niki, and tucks that spare behind his ear for later.

 

 _Well, now I shan't be getting my end in,_ James announces. He's horrifying. _What are you going to do about it?_

That night at James' house. With the chirrups of all his hundred budgies. A bottle of wine between them and Niki watching James work on his Skalextric. He was building Brands Hatch. Niki had showered and used James' soap on his underarms and crotch, and told him to sleep on the sofa three times.

 

There are always cubbyholes and storerooms at clubs like this. Places for underhand trades and haphazard lovers. James and Niki are six of one, a half dozen of the other. James keeps calling Marlene a fine, fine woman as he unbuttons Niki's corduroys.

 

 _Does she--?_ he starts, and Niki doesn't let him finish. Puts his dick between James' lips to shut him up.

 

James jerks back, spits, smiles. _You always tell me I suck you off awfully,_ he says.

 

_I don't. When have I ever said that?_

_Whenever I've sucked you off, I suppose,_ James says.

 

He had been told to sleep on the sofa. He hadn't listened, and for all his efforts, Niki had only ended up insulting him. He'd come, of course, but he hadn't thanked James for it.

 

 _You know,_ James says, settling into the fist Niki has in his hair, _she hates it when you call her to heel like a hound._

 

 _Be quiet,_ Niki snaps.

 

James is quite happy to collect Niki's restrained, buck-toothed orgasms as well. He can only count them on one hand so far. Plenty more to go.

 

Niki gets himself off, and comes on his fingers and on James' mouth.

 

 _Give us a hankie,_ James asks.

 

 _Fuck you,_ Niki replies. He has a handkerchief in his back pocket, and fishes it out. Wipes James' lips for him. Presses his thumbs to the corner of James' pleasant, sloppy grin. _You cannot fuck my wife. Don't try._

_I might try more often,_ James says tactlessly, _if this is how it ends._

*

 

Marlene is waiting outside the storeroom, changed out of her heels and in her comfortable shoes for the ride home. _Andreas,_ she says, and she only calls Niki that when she's knows she's in the right. She doesn't acknowledge James.

 

 _Andreas,_ she says; _komm._


End file.
